Where Angels Tread
by Anera527
Summary: Joe Miller's plea is only days away and all of Broadchurch is waiting for the verdict, but no more so than Beth Latimer as she nurses her hatred of the man who killed her son. And then she meets a mysterious stranger along the cliffs at Broadchurch, and she finds that maybe she can find a way to lay the past to rest. BC S2 compliant.
1. Chapter 1

" _ **where angels tread"**_

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A/N: This is a crossover between our favorite British tv show and a little-known tv show of the 80s called 'Highway To Heaven'. A bit of a different twist to a BC fanfic, but I was struck by this idea and it wouldn't let me go. I debated putting this story up at all but ultimately I decided that it was still a story that can be told. It'll only be about three chapters long and despite the title of and the crossover tv show it will not be overtly religious.

My other stories, specifically 'Under Different Stars' and 'Everybody Wants To Rule the World' haven't been abandoned; I've taken a brief detour into the 'Bonanza' fandom, and a couple weeks ago I was laid off my job, so until RL settles down again updates will be sporadic at best. But they will still be finished.

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 _Alright, alright, what is the set up here? I mean, who's your boss?_

 _God._

 _What?_

 _My boss. It's God._

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It was a grey and overcast (but surprisingly dry) windy autumn evening when Beth Latimer left the stifling atmosphere of her home and walked along the cliffs of Broadchurch. She had been steadily growing more and more stifled in the four walls of her household as the weather grew chill and the nights longer until finally she bade Mark and Chloe goodbye for the evening and left for her favorite walking trail.

Her swollen belly hampered both her speed and her endurance and she had to stop for a moment halfway up the cliff. Her hands automatically came up to rest atop her stomach that was so steadily growing this other life inside of her and she felt the familiar surge of love and resentment stir within her much as she tried to suppress it.

It had been now been months since her Danny, her little boy, had been murdered by Joe Miller but the pain was as strong as it had been since first finding his body on the beach. It was as she had told Paul—although her heart had melted seeing her unborn baby growing in her womb, there still wasn't enough room in her soul for another child when she still couldn't let go of Danny. In some moments she would feel her baby move and she would smile with the unconditional love of a mother; then in others a loathing would choke her for this growing parasite and fleetingly (shamefully) she'd wonder why she didn't already go and abort the pregnancy.

Well. It was far too late for abortion. The only thing left to do now was to carry to full term.

With a sigh Beth sat down on a boulder and looked out over the ocean crashing along the shore below her. It was peaceful here. It allowed her to think.

"Penny for your thoughts," came a sudden voice from behind her. Startled, Beth jerked fully upright from her tired slouch and twisted on her seat to find she'd been followed. Surprise made her speak without speaking.

"Who the hell are you?"

She immediately winced at the unbelievably rude words of her greeting fell in the air, waiting for her newfound company to become insulted, but the man merely grinned in easy reply. "A stranger," he said simply, as if that explained everything.

Maybe it did. Beth cleared her throat nervously and shifted again on her spot. "I-… ah, I didn't realize you were up here too." At this specific spot she was sure she would have either seen him or heard his approach.

His grin gentled in a way that told her he guessed the drift of her thoughts. "I didn't think you would," he assured her quietly. "You were miles away."

She glanced back at him sharply. Something about him reminded her about Steve Connelly and it made her uneasy. "Not the most polite thing to do, sneaking up on me like that."

"Your greeting wasn't so polite, either, so let's just call it even." He seemed genuinely amused by her sharp tongue, not put off in the slightest. "You looked like you could use some company."

It was on the tip of her tongue to let him know in no uncertain terms that she was perfectly happy to spend this time by herself, thank you, but she paused before the words left her mouth. "If you want to," she found herself saying instead.

"Thanks."

Her heart finally evening out again, Beth let her hands drop away from her stomach and took a moment to look over the stranger. It was hard to determine his age but she supposed he was in his late 40s, small and stocky with curling hair grown to his shoulders. Plain worn blue jeans, faded white sneakers, a weathered brown leather jacket—he seemed entirely out of place and the stranger he professed to be. "I'm sorry, I didn't as you your name."

He seated himself on the opposite edge of the boulder facing her. He had an easy smile, open and warm. "Jonathan Smith."

She snorted. "'John Doe' would've been a bit too obvious, wouldn't it?"

"Maybe. I didn't choose it."

His dry remark made her lip twitch with real amusement. "Parents always think they're clever."

"My father certainly has a sense of humor."

She smiled politely, not wishing to discuss families long dead. "I'm Beth."

"I know."

On guard, Beth stiffened again. "I'm sure you do," she said bitterly. There she went again with the rude remarks before she could stop them from slipping out, but she was _tired_. Reporters had run around Broadchurch following Joe Miller's arrest and Beth just wanted some normalcy back in her life and not be recognized by everyone on the street.

Jonathan simply looked at her for a quiet moment before he answered. "A friend told me," he admitted. "I'm not a reporter, Beth. I'm not here to get the latest news on how the estranged family is doing."

"Then what are you here for?"

There it was, that gentle grin that somehow put her at ease rather than increasing her mistrust. "Like I said: you looked like you could use some company."

"I'm married," she told him shortly, just in case he really was some sick bastard wanting to hit on her.

He nodded. "I know."

Of course he would know that, following the story of Danny's murder. He didn't say anything else after that declaration but he also didn't move closer to her, or move at all, actually. It seemed he was waiting for her to speak.

She floundered, put off by the quiet. "What are you doing so far from America, then?" His accent was clearly born and bred across the pond.

He shrugged. "I travel a lot. Never stay in one place for very long. I was just passing through when my boss told me to take a few days here."

"Just like that? Wish I had a boss like that, giving me a vacation on a whim." Her grin died quickly, however, weighted down by the past few months. Danny would never go on vacation with his family again. "I got too crowded in my house," she confessed suddenly. "I needed some air."

"Crowded and irritating," he agreed about the house. "The view here certainly is worth the climb. I thought the Pacific was beautiful."

"You lived by the ocean, too, then?"

"All along the California coast for- oh, about twenty years." He looked out upon the waters again, that same slight smile on his face. "Nothing more beautiful in the world than the sea." For a moment he was quiet, contemplating the view, then he looked over at her again. "So what's the matter then?"

Beth barked a bitter laugh, burrowing into her light jacket. "What's not the matter anymore? You've watched the news, read the papers—my best friend's husband murdered my son." She couldn't contain the hatred in her voice.

Jonathan surely noticed the tone but he didn't point it out. He didn't speak at all, actually; he waited.

She shook her head despairingly. "Joe Miller's plea hearing is only a few days away. It's the moment that I've been waiting for since Danny died—to hear his killer admit he's guilty."

"He might say he's guilty. He might not." The way he said it sounded like a caution. "Guilt plays a funny game. It makes you say and do things you might not otherwise do."

She glared at him, tempted to stand up and walk away. She couldn't run from him as she had Connelly but her fury with this man was swiftly reaching the same levels she'd had with the con man. "You sound like you're taking his side."

"I'm not. What Joe Miller did to Danny was his own doing." It was spoken matter-of-factly, so much so that Beth couldn't help but be slightly mollified with the response. She unclenched her hands and forced herself to inhale deeply. "You're angry."

The simple remark made her nod. "All the time," she admitted quietly. "I hate Joe Miller for what he did. I'm furious with myself, with Mark… even Danny, for not telling us what was going on. And Ellie…" She trailed off, finding it difficult to speak aloud about her former best friend.

Her fury directed towards Ellie Miller was still burning strong.

"You get tired after awhile."

For a split second Beth was scared she spoken of her exhaustion aloud, but after a moment she realized that it had been Jonathan who had last spoken. She caught his gaze, realizing belatedly that his eyes were a shade of tepid green similar to her own. "You sound like you've been tired before, too."

Jonathan stood, breaking the moment apart as he slid his hands into the pockets of his beaten jacket. "Everyone has been or will be, Beth. What matters is what we do after we've dropped from the exhaustion." And as abruptly as he had started a conversation with her, he nodded a farewell. "I'm sure I'll see you around. Enjoy your view."

Startled and a bit put off by such a short dismissal, Beth looked over at the same view Jonathan had just mentioned, her hair tousled by the sea breeze. When she turned back to the trail leading back down to the beach she found Jonathan gone and the walking path empty.


	2. Chapter 2

**_"Chapter 2"_**

She saw Jonathan again only a week later. Broadchurch was in an uproar following Joe Miller's plea of 'not guilty', but Beth had been steadily drifting in a cloud of haze and shock knowing that her little boy was still not receiving the justice he so sorely deserved. Mark had tried to talk to her about it but she had quickly shut him down and focused on her swiftly-burning rage against the ones who had so definitively destroyed her family.

He was down at the beach near enough to the water's edge that she wondered if she'd find his feet wet from wading. He was still wearing those old worn clothes except for the leather jacket; today he'd opted to have only a light blue long-sleeved shirt, and idly Beth wondered why he still bothered to wear such out-of-style clothes.

"You knew, didn't you?" she demanded as soon as she was within earshot. Not much of a stellar greeting, she knew, but her hackles had been raised for days now. "You knew that Joe was going to plead not guilty!"

"I suspected," he countered her in his quiet way. He didn't seem particularly put off by her approach or her accusation. Today, his apparent inherent passiveness made her want to lash out.

So she did. "What the hell are you playing at? No one could guess he was going to plead that way! You told me that guilt could make someone do things they wouldn't otherwise do, like you know what he was thinking! Have you been visiting him at his jail cell and talking to him?"

Jonathan shook his head. "I'd have no reason to do that, Beth."

"Then how were you so sure?"

The furious shout stalled his answer for a moment. When his reply came it was without a change in stance or expression. "Because I've known better men than Joe Miller become ensnared in their guilt the way he has."

The simple, honest statement stole the wind from Beth's sails. Honesty. It had been such a long time since she'd had such a transparent conversation. The baby kicked her. "I saw Ellie there, at the hearing," she said, startling herself. "Sitting with Hardy, having the gall to cry for her precious husband." She spat the last word. "She probably thinks that she can save face by appearing innocent in all of this."

His expression had shifted now, so minutely she hadn't immediately noticed it. His eyes were frosty with disagreement. "Have you considered, Beth," he volunteered quietly, "that Ellie Miller truly didn't know anything about what Joe was doing?"

His words were like a slap to her face; she wondered why it felt like betrayal. "How would you know?" she countered sharply. "You're just a stranger passing through. You weren't here during the- the investigation." Beth was pleased she only stumbled a little on mentioning Danny's murder aloud.

Jonathan's gaze was steady. Did nothing faze him? "Some could say you haven't been here yourself, Beth."

Her throat tightened. "How did this get turned back on me? I've lost my boy, my little boy— it's Joe, and Ellie. They're the guilty ones!"

"Yeah, you're right: you've lost Danny. No one can fault you for how you feel— no one should be trying to tell you how to feel. But it's about time you stopped thinking just of yourself."

"How dare you!"

Beth found herself shaking with fury, her hands balled into fists painfully at her sides. Her shout echoed along the beach and hit her in the face as it bounced off of the cliff behind them. She was tempted to slap him, stranger or not, and see the disapproval in his eyes disappear.

"How can you—? You can't think that I- I think of my family every day. Mark, Chloe— I think of them all the time—"

"In correlation with Danny." His tone had sharpened. "And you're punishing your family by doing so. Your husband, your daughter— you've neglected them in your grief. And that small, unborn life still growing; you've already decided that it won't ever come close to what Danny was. Tell me, Beth, how is that fair?"

She had no answer. Her anger had burnt itself out for the moment, leaving her shaken and numb. "I… I've got to go," she heard herself say, and then she was turning and practically fleeing from the water's edge, desperate to calm her roiling stomach.

Damn him! Who did he think he was, demanding her to answer such questions? Of course she was attentive to Mark and Chloe. She loved them, didn't she? They were her family, the same as Danny was… and that was when she realized the point Jonathan had made. Every thought she'd had of Mark or Chloe, and especially her unborn child, was always followed by the memory of Danny. Like she was comparing. Like she was judging.

She reached the pier overlooking the ocean and sitting down on one of the benches she buried her face in her hands. Tears pricked at her eyes but she forced them back, unwilling to break down now. She was stronger than that.

So why, then, did she feel so close to shattering?

~/~/~/~/~

Mark was never answering her calls. Nige didn't know where he was. Concern was turning into irritation the more her husband continued to skirt around the issues that were still between them. She focused on Joe Miller's trial, determined to see her child's killer put behind bars for what he had done. She and Mark joined forces to try and convince Jocelyn Knight she needed to help the Latimer family but it was only barely that the older woman caved at all and decided to do as they asked.

Sharon Bishop showed up and as soon as she stepped foot on Broadchurch's sand she was displaying her true dirty colors.

Danny was exhumed to be examined like a discarded piece of evidence rather than left alone as a victim of a demented madman. Why did they have to dig up Beth's agony while they were at it? Her fury exploded at her son's gravesite again, fully forgetting Jonathan's question in Ellie's defense, and she ignored the tears in her old friend's eyes as she screamed at Ellie.

If she had only been able to look past her own anger, she would have seen a face as devastated and agonized as her own.

Jonathan found her later that same day as she sat staring at the ocean from the same spot they'd first spoken at. He hadn't yet approached her while in town (she'd never seen him there, anyway, except for when he was leaving The Traders) but out here he seemed comfortable enough to speak with her. Beth didn't really mind when she thought about it; she supposed she wouldn't want their talks to take place while in town anyway.

He knew already of Danny's exhumation; the sadness in his expression was obvious. He sat beside her with his hands buried deeply in his pockets, following her gaze out to the horizon. Gulls cried in the distance.

"I told her I hated her today," she confessed suddenly in the silence.

She turned to glance at him in time to see him nod. His wearied disappointment was worse to see than his irritation. "I know."

~/~/~/~/~

She didn't see him again until after Elizabeth was born. At that point she had thought he had left Broadchurch altogether, that his boss had finally called him back to wherever he was needed. It did amuse her at one point to recall the obvious wry fondness in his tone every time he mentioned his boss. Maybe Beth would grow curious enough one day to ask him his boss's name.

It was following yet another exhausting and draining day at court that she sought refuge by herself out on the causeway above the dam, one of her running trails that was rarely frequented by tourists even in the height of summer. The sun was hot on the back of her neck; she shouldn't have decided to keep her jacket on. She was just sliding it off when she heard him call her name.

"Haven't seen you in awhile. I thought you'd left." She allowed the obvious to start the conversation.

He smiled. "The boss gave me a few more days. Said I could work from home."

Beth looked at him curiously. "Where's 'home'?"

Jonathan shrugged. "Anywhere I want it to be."

"Touche." Beth managed a grin, surprised that she still retained a sense of humor. Down the walkway she saw a old man seated there in an old plaid shirt and dirty ball cap, his thick white beard visible even from several yards away. He was definitely watching her and Jonathan. "You have company today," she remarked. "Your dad?"

Finally he looked surprised. He barked a laugh. "Mark? No. No, we're not related. He's just a very good friend of mine." Turning he called out, "She thinks we're related, buddy."

The old man may have been bent over from age but his voice was still loud and full of spirit. "That's it! I'm not travelin' with you anymore, Jonathan, I'm not gonna stand to be called your dad. You ain't my kid."

"If there's any kid here, Mark, it's you."

Ouch. Beth's smile widened. The old man straightened where he sat. "And I ain't dead yet, either, so you gotta respect your elders."

Beth laughed outright, unable to help it. Jonathan sent him a look she didn't quite understand, something that promised a remark later when she was no longer in their company. When he turned back to her, the smile on his face softened. "Congratulations, by the way. Did everything go alright?"

Of course he would have heard of the baby's birth. Beth nodded. "Ellie insisted on being there for the whole time but other than that it was fine. She had the audacity to congratulate me about Lizzy's birth. I told her to leave."

He sighed. "She was showing she cared, Beth. What's wrong with that?"

The anger from a few days ago had faded again. Unbidden she told him about the past few days at court, of Sharon Bishop's accusing Ellie and Hardy of an affair, and of the dismissal of Joe's confession due to Ellie's beating him while in the interrogation room. When finally it was all out in the open she shook her head in dismay.

"I accused her of deliberately hurting Joe so that he would get off. And now, I- I'm not sure what I feel. We go back to court in a few days again and I dread it, wondering what else could go wrong."

"You can't help other peoples' actions. You can only decide yours, you know that."

Beth laughed bitterly. "You know that Paul tried to baptize Lizzy the other day? Mark stopped him. Said that God wasn't part of our household."

Jonathan raised his eyebrows. "Did you try to stop Paul?"

"No."

The man grinned in real amusement. "It seems to me that God's already knocking on your household door, then."

"That's what Paul said. He said he thought that God was a part of our family."

"Smart man. I should go talk to him sometime."

"You believe in God and you still haven't talked to the local vicar, yet?" The joke slipped out before she could stop it. "What sort of Christian are you?"

"A bad one," he admitted with a soft smile. "You can raise Lizzy anyway you want to, Beth, but it doesn't hurt to tell her that God loves her. Sometimes that's all someone needs to hear."

"I don't know if I can say that to her yet," she confessed. "Not so soon after Danny… Paul told me that he wasn't sure why God would create my son and then just as quickly take him away. He said that some believe it's because God takes those he loves most first."

There it was again, that flicker in his eyes that seemed to harden his expression somehow. "You know, Mark down there," he nodded back to his friend, "once blamed himself for the death of a five-year-old girl; we'd found her at an amusement park lost and he thought if we hadn't reunited her with her mother when we did then they wouldn't have been in a wreck caused by a drunk driver on the way home."

Beth's heart softened with pity. She didn't need the details of the wreck to imagine the devastation caused by the wreck. She could guess the point Jonathan was trying to make. "And your friend asked why the little girl was killed so horribly."

"Why God allowed it to happen is more like it."

"Why did He?"

Jonathan glanced back at the waiting old man. There was something there in his expression that she had never seen before and it scared her. "He didn't," he answered shortly, "anymore than He allowed Joe Miller to kill your son."

"He could've stopped it!"

"We all make choices, Beth. Every day, every minute of our lives is made up of choices, what we will or won't do. God doesn't dictate or control our every action while here on this Earth; we have the free will to decide for ourselves. Both the good and the bad. What's the point of blaming God for our own choices?"

"You really believe that." The words slipped out quietly; she felt like he had swept the rug out from under her. Paul's words from so many months ago had allowed her some measure of anger, even hatred, to this God who had stolen her son from her because He had wanted danny for Himself. Now here was Jonathan, swiftly tearing down the unsure, regretful words of Broadchurch's local vicar and shifting the blame of Danny's murder squarely on the shoulders of man.

Jonathan reached out and grasped her shoulder; weathered hands, hardened by honest work but surprisingly gentle. "You can't call a child dying God's will."

How could he speak of such things so surely? Her walls of steadfast hatred and anger were starting to crumble.

'Please, Beth, don't give up. Not now. Not after all you've been through. Fight. Fight for Danny, for yourself. For your family. And fight for your friends."

Beth took a steadying breath and looked up wearily, knowing already who it was he was alluding to with the mention of 'friends'. "Ellie means nothing to me, Jonathan. She's not my friend." The venom in her voice was weak even as she said it.

"She's not now. But she can be again, if only you'd let her."

She was so deep in thought then she didn't immediately notice that he was walking away from her. A moment of panic choked her at his sudden absence. "Jonathan!" As he turned to look at her inquisitively she struggled with a mouthful of words, feeling like she was suffocating on them. She nodded in the direction of the waiting Mark. "He's your friend, yeah? Has he ever turned his back on you? Betrayed you?"

There was something sad in his grin as he nodded. "Turned his back? Yeah. But you want to know something, Beth? I forgave him. He's not long for this world." And without waiting for a reply (which she didn't have) he turned around again and walked away. Beth watched him help Mark to stand, his hand trailing across the old man's wide shoulders as he helped his friend down the causeway. Something he said made the old man laugh aloud.

Friends. Just the thought of friendship made her feel lonely. Ellie had been that friend once; the one she could call at any time on any day and know that she wouldn't be brushed off. Ellie had never hesitated to hug her or lay her hand on Beth's arm to calm or comfort her.

Sitting down on the nearest bench, she thought about the day in court when Joe's confession was dismissed. Hardy had been the one to try and save it; but throughout it all he had tried to place the blame squarely on his own shoulders. He had wanted to save Ellie from further blame, she realized. A mark of friendship, perhaps? But they had hated each other during the case, Ellie and Hardy— or so Beth recalled from late-night conversations during the case. And he had been rather cold and aloof in a way even throughout the beginning. So why the sudden change of heart towards Ellie now? Unless, she thought to herself treacherously, Jonathan was right and Ellie really hadn't known what Joe had done…

The walls crumbled completely. Once the thought was there she couldn't put it back.

And she tried to put it back. Oh, how she tried.


	3. Chapter 3

**_"Chapter 3"_**

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A/N: Almost done; only an epilogue to go. Thank you for those who have read and reviewed so far!

The story Jonathan tells Beth in this chapter of a boy who was assaulted and raped and left for dead is true. Names are deliberately left out to protect the family's privacy.

~/~/~/~/~

Mark had lied to her. He had lied, and he'd withheld just how much he seemed to resent his life with Beth. Her fury and betrayal, starting to finally cool, was bursting into fiery life again and she was fully embracing it. Fourteen years. Fourteen damn years of her life she had gladly given him as well as three beautiful children and he had been prepared to throw it all away for a one-night stand with a flashy, fake, and shallow blonde bitch—

A knock on the front door stopped her inward seething for a moment, startled away by her surprise. She wondered briefly if maybe she had imagined the sound but then it came again, teasing her. Muttering a foul curse under her breath she stalked forward to grab hold of the handle and swung open the door.

"Hello, Beth."

She blinked, feeling suddenly wrong-footed. "Jonathan. What are you doing here?"

"I heard about court today. What was said." He raised a hand hurriedly when he realized incriminating his words sounded, wanting to placate her stoked anger. "It hasn't been spoken about online and it won't appear in the headlines. The papers are keeping quiet about what happened this time."

Beth frowned. "How do you know that?"

He shrugged. "Had a talk with Maggie Radcliffe. Seems she'll be keeping it all locked down."

Finally, a bit of news that wasn't awful. It made her sag with relief. She stepped back from the doorway. "Come on in. Rude of me to leave you standing out in the wind."

"Thank you." He seemed unbothered by said wind, chilly as it was coming off of the sea. He looked at her carefully when she closed the door and faced him. "Where did Mark end up going?"

She wondered briefly if he had deliberately brought up the source of her latest target of anger just to work her through it. "Duuno. He walked off. I came back to be with Lizzie." So saying she turned and walked over to where the little baby girl lay awake and gurgling to herself in her pram. Beth couldn't help a smile from forming as her little girl looked up at her with clear blue eyes. "Missing your mummy, are you, Lizzie?" she asked softly, and cradling the child's head she picked her up in her arms, securing her against her chest. The baby gurgled and blew bubbles; Beth leaned down and grabbed a rag to place over her shirt in case Lizzie made a mess. She felt oddly proud as she turned to show her daughter to Jonathan. "This is Elizabeth. Named after my mum."

The delight in his smile couldn't have been more obvious as he looked down at the child. "She's beautiful."

"Yeah, she is." Beth rocked her back and forth slowly, watching Lizzie's eyes start to close. "I don't know why I used to resent her," she confessed quietly. "Before she was born I didn't want her at all." She looked up. "I want to protect her, Jonathan."

He nodded. "I know."

"I didn't protect Danny."

"No, you didn't." His quiet gentleness kept the words from being a slap. Honesty again. He was someone used to speaking his mind, she realized, and he wasn't going to hesitate to do so now. "But then he was responsible for his own actions. You know that."

"Sometimes I wish I didn't. I hated myself for thinking it, but there was a moment when I wondered what all had happened between Danny and Joe. Hardy told me that there was nothing between them but- hugging—" she tripped over the suddenly loathsome word, "but I…"

"You ask what-if."

"Yeah." She felt tears abruptly sting her eyes and she pushed them back with an effort. She'd done far too much crying today already. "And why Danny agreed to go along with Joe."

"He turned Joe down, Beth. That night, he was going to walk away. He wanted to tell you and Mark about what was going on. He'd realized what Joe was doing."

Beth stared at him. "How do you know that?"

"I talked with Ellie." There it was, that blunt honesty again. He was looking at her like he knew what she was thinking. "She heard the tape of her husband's confession. Joe admitted to Danny's refusing him." He smiled sadly. "You and Mark raised your son correctly, Beth. Remember that. He wanted to get out of something that was harmful."

"And it killed him." There it was, that realization that in some ways Danny was responsible for his own death. He had chosen to meet with Joe Miller. But no— she realized that that was what Jonathan had told her a couple of days ago, about choices. Danny had chosen to meet with Joe, yes; that she couldn't dispute.

But Joe had been the one to decide to begin those meetings in the first place.

And it had been Joe's hands that had killed her boy. And it was Joe who was refusing to plead guilty to the crime he had committed.

"You know, there was a crime committed a few months ago over in America that I'd heard about. An eleven year old boy was playing with a friend of his and he was lured into the woods by a man. He was sexually assaulted and left for dead there. And it happened in a small town, smaller than Broadchurch. About six hundred people live there."

"Did they catch him?"

He nodded. "While he was watching the playground, yeah." She gasped in disgust. "There's evidence that proves he was the one who did it. He pleaded not guilty."

"Bastard," she breathed, her arms tightening protectively around Lizzy. "How do they think they can get away with things like that?"

"They can't, really. Not in the way that really matters. They may plead not guilty, Beth, but that in way proves that they're bothered by the crime they've committed— they don't want to face up to what they've done."

"That still doesn't help put them away," Beth muttered bitterly.

Jonathan snorted. "No, it doesn't. That's where human beings fail. And they fail pretty spectacularly sometimes."

"You don't have to tell me that."

"No. I don't suppose anyone does." His voice was quiet. "Just remember that there's a lot of people in the world who are still good. Right now you may not believe me but there are."

Ellie. She could remember her old friend's arms circling around her protectively as she wept on the stairs after Mark's confession on the stand earlier today. Ellie had been there to comfort her. 'This is Joe doing this to us,' she remembered Ellie whispering to her. And Beth knew now that her friend blamed Joe and hated him just as much as anyone else did.

Maybe, just maybe, she could try to pick up the pieces of her friendship with Ellie. Those arms had felt strong and sturdy, just what she'd needed in that moment, and had proven that even though Beth had shrugged her off again and again Ellie was still willing to forgive her.

It shamed her in a way.

Lizzie gurgled again, breaking her out of her thoughts. "What happened to the boy, Jonathan? The one across the pond?"

"He lived." He grinned slightly, clearly having waited for her to ask. "With four skull fractures and several missing teeth but he walked away from the crime scene under his own power."

The expected rush of bitterness didn't come. Beth didn't wonder why her son had died in a similar situation and another boy had lived; instead she remembered Cate Gillispie and the woman's utter brokenness in the loss of her daughter. She thought about her own pain from Danny's loss, and somehow she found it in her heart to be glad that another mother did not have to suffer the grief of losing a child.

Hefting Lizzie up, Beth nodded towards the kitchen. "Fancy a cuppa?"

"I wouldn't turn it down." He followed her into the kitchen, leaning against the cupboard above the sink. With a faint grin, Beth did what even a month ago would have been unthinkable after losing Danny: she held out her daughter to him.

"Do you mind?"

The ease with which he took the fragile child spoke volumes. It was clear he adored her just as everyone else did. Beth kept a surreptitious eye on Lizzie while she put coffee on but she didn't have any real need to; Jonathan held her securely, safely. "Do you have children, Jonathan?" she asked suddenly in the silence.

The question took him aback. She realized that that perhaps wasn't the politest of questions to straight-out ask him— but of course she'd never had any problem with being frank with him before, she thought wryly. But he appeared to be the sort of man who would want a family.

There was something in his expression then, however, that she didn't immediately recognize. "A daughter," he finally replied softly. "I haven't seen her in several years."

The pain of separation; that's what was there in his eyes. "I'm sorry."

He shook his head, letting her know she was okay. "It's been a long time ago now. She has a family and children of her own. She's happy."

The coffee finished brewing. Beth poured them both a cup and set them down at the table. "Happy," she sighed, running her fingers down the side of her mug. Its warmth stung her fingers. Jonathan sat opposite her, still holding her daughter so that Lizzie lay against his shoulder. Taking a sip of her drink, she sat in silence for a long moment. "What should I do, Jonathan?" she asked suddenly. "Mark keeps on telling me that there will be no more secrets between us but then this… he says under oath that he wanted to leave me for Becca Fisher on the same night Danny died. He was having sex in her car the same moment that Danny was being strangled to death. What's the point of keeping our marriage intact? If the trial collapses now it's his fault."

"You're doing it again."

Taken aback, she straightened. "Doing what?"

He took a sip of his own coffee; black, she noticed, but he wasn't bothered by its bitterness. "Blaming. Just a few weeks ago you were blaming Ellie for what had happened. Why didn't she notice anything off with her husband? Now, when Mark has to talk about something that happened months ago, you blame him."

"He kept evidence from Jocelyn. He didn't tell me about what he'd been doing. Writing me a letter, damn it, telling me that our marriage was done. He wanted it over." The heat of her drink when she swallowed seemed to last all the way down to her stomach. "How do I know he isn't still wanting to leave me?"

"I think your answer is right here." With a quick nod down at Lizzie, he pointed out the very point he was trying to make. "What he did was wrong, yeah; that I can't disagree with. But what did he do when you told him you were pregnant with Lizzie?"

Thinking back was painful; those weeks of the investigation were heavy with resentment and fury. She remembered that night in their bedroom when the secret of her pregnancy had slipped out of her mouth. "He.. smiled all sort of funny," she said aloud. "Like when I'd first told him I was pregnant with Chloe. Such a dumb little grin, but it was the best thing in the world. He told me I had to keep the baby."

Jonathan was grinning himself. "He wanted this child, Beth. On the heels of losing Danny, he wanted a second chance. This was it. This is your second chance. For both of you."

"I know that," she admitted. "And I hope we can salvage our marriage, but…" She trailed off, unable to articulate exactly the point she was trying to make.

"You know, the Hebrews were told by God in the Bible that to have a child meant that their marriage was blessed."

She stared at him, taken aback. "How do you know so much of that?" she demanded, the old confusion bubbling to the surface now. "You seem to know a lot of all that religious stuff. Are you a minister?"

His grin softened. "No. Not a minister. Just someone who's traveled around a lot. You pick up a lot of stuff that way."

"So you're like a… what is it called? Someone who goes out and talks to others. A missionary?"

He seemed taken aback by the term, like he hadn't thought of it quite that way. "Yeah. I suppose you could put it that way. The boss wants to help as many people in the world as possible."

"Well, that explains why you haven't spoken to Paul yet," she said jokingly, "having that much knowledge yourself about God you don't need to talk to a reverend."

He chuckled. "That could be it." Standing, he walked around the corner of the table and keeping Lizzie's neck braced handed the baby over to Beth's arms. "I'm glad you're feeling better. When Mark comes back tonight, don't brush him away; let him make the first move. He's been hurting as much as you are, but in a worse way."

"How's that?" she asked curiously.

"He actually has something to feel guilty about. Think on that when he comes back."

Guilt makes people do funny things. Again Jonathan's words from weeks ago echoed back at her. The front door closed softly behind him before she could even realize that he was leaving, and bracing herself she stood up from the table to see him walking across the field towards the rest of the town.

She wondered if he was right about guilt. It had made Joe Miller deny his killing Danny, according to him. Could Mark's guilt be the cause of his aloofness? She didn't know how well she could forgive her husband for what had happened but she supposed she could do as Jonathan had suggested: let Mark make the first move and go from there.

Gathering Lizzie up in her arms, she kissed the soft head and took a deep breath.

It didn't occur to her until much later that, somehow, Jonathan had known Mark would not show up at the house until night.

~/~/~/~/~

Joe Miller played the system and walked away a free man. The jury found him innocent in the murder of Danny Latimer, which didn't make sense to Beth. Murder always had a guilty party, so why didn't they try to solve it? All murderers deserved to be punished.

And Joe was guilty. Everyone knew it.

Even Joe himself.

Frustrated and weary, Beth walked down the pier down at the beach, willing the salty air and wind to calm her. Its low moaning was soothing in a way and she had often sought refuge by the ocean's shore when life became too stressful. Today, it did very little.

She was surprised to discover when she reached the bench closest to the end of the pier that Jonathan's friend— also called Mark, she suddenly remembered— was seated there by himself. He was so bent over from age that she didn't know how he managed to walk, much less make it all the way down here. Looking around she searched for a glimpse of Jonathan but saw nothing. Frowning she made her way over to the old man.

"Mark?"

He'd been dozing; her quiet voice jerked him awake. "Huh? Wha- oh. Didn't see you there, ma'am. Didn't ignore you too much, did I?"

She found herself smiling at his joke. His face was wrinkled with age and his beard was bushier than she'd first thought but his dark eyes were kind as he looked up at her. This was a man who enjoyed a joke, even if he would be the only one laughing at it. "No," she assured him. "I'm sorry if I startled you, but I saw you sitting by yourself here and I wondered if everything was alright. I don't see Jonathan around."

The mention of his friend's name caught his attention. He squinted up at her for a moment, then his eyebrows rose in recognition. "Oh, you're Beth Latimer. The one who was up there at the causeway the other day talkin' with him."

She nodded. "Yeah. The one who asked if you were his father."

He snorted. "I'll tell you somethin', Mrs., he was amused by that. Not much can make him laugh like that anymore."

She frowned. "Why not?"

He shrugged. "When your best friend is dyin' it kinda takes the enjoyment outta your life, you know?" It was said so bluntly she almost gaped at him; he recognized the shock in her expression at such blunt words and he laughed under his breath. "Ah, it's not so bad. And Jonathan knows that; he's not bitter about it. Just sad."

"I'm sorry." There were those words again, the same ones she had grown to loathe after Danny's death, but now they came without problem.

He waved them away. "Don't have anythin' to feel sorry about. Dying's a part of life. The Boss knows what He's doing."

The familiar mention of a 'boss' made Beth frown. "The boss?"

He nodded. "Yeah. Sorry, I meant God. He's the boss of everything, ain't he?"

The boss… She frowned slightly to herself, trying to put two and two together, but the answer slipped out of her hands. She'd never heard it put that way before. "I guess," she finally conceded slowly. "Where's Jonathan?"

Mark motioned vaguely out towards the town. "Out there somewhere. Told me he had somethin' he needed to do and said he'd be back later." He shrugged, unconcerned, and looked over at her for a long moment. "He told me about the trial today. How that man got off."

Her gut twisted. "He played the system. My son isn't going to get the justice he needs."

"Wouldn't be too sure about that, ma'am. Killers get their comeuppance sooner or later. He ain't gonna have a normal life after this, you know. Joe Miller. He's gonna be shunned pretty much anywhere he goes."

Anywhere he goes… The thought stayed with her. There was one thing for certain: Joe could not remain in Broadchurch. Not at all. Not ever. Ellie had told her that Joe had been asking about her and his boys while still in jail— the disgust and, yes, even fear in her voice spoke volumes.

She wondered what the town could get away with when it came to Joe Miller.

"Have you seen stuff like this before, Mark?" she asked. "Murders and things like that?"

He snorted. "Seen it? Beth, I was a cop for twenty years. I saw worse things than what Joe did to your boy. And there were crimes we never did solve. Killers who were never brought to justice. It makes you mad. Upsets you."

She was surprised by his confession; he didn't seem to be material to be a cop. "Didn't you ever get tired of it all?"

"Oh yeah. I got tired of it. Twenty years of that and I'd had enough. I got outta the force and went off on my own. Found myself at the bottom of a bottle more often than not. I thought the only thing I could do was turn off the set."

"Was it?" She didn't suppose so; he didn't seem to be a drunk now.

"Jonathan challenged me on that when I first met him. He followed me to a bar and talked to me. Told me that instead of shutting out the world I could try changing it. Stubborn little cuss. He was right, though. He helped me give up drinkin' and so I've been travelin' with him ever since, helping him help people."

Changing the world. Was it really as simple as this old man was making it out to be? She doubted it but then she thought about the way Jonathan spoke so openly and honestly and wondered. This old man was a good example of what a helping hand could do.

"I suppose," she said aloud, putting her thoughts in order, "that you change the world one person at a time, then, huh?"

He grinned. "You got it. Maybe you can try the same now, even with the trial done. Help instead of hurt."

"If you're talking about Joe Miller—"

"Nah. Not him. He ain't gonna change. But you can help others who want it. Trust me: it's worth it in the end."

She chewed on her lower lip. "I… don't know if I can do that yet."

The old man nodded. "Yeah. I know. Do me a favor, though: think about it. You wanted to set up a charity. Start there."

She smiled in confusion. "How do you know about that?" The only ones who knew about her desire to begin a charity in Danny's name were Paul and Maggie… oh. "Maggie told Jonathan about that, didn't she?"

Mark nodded. "Yeah. And personally I think you should do it. You could help a lot of people that way. It'd be good for you, too."

Her smile softened. Following the disastrous attempt at meeting reformed sex offenders at Paul's insistence she had become disheartened and had been tempted to lay the ideas of a charity in Danny's name aside. "I think I like you, Mark."

"Glad someone does," he joked.

She stood. "It was nice meeting you, and thanks for the advice. I needed it." Her heart was still hurting and she was still furious about Joe's being found not guilty but she found that her talk with this old man had allowed her a breather, a chance to step back and look at the situation anew.

She needed to go talk with her husband. Maybe they could decide between themselves of what to do with Joe. As she turned to walk back up the pier she caught a glimpse of a figure who she had cause to hate.

Sharon Bishop.

The defense lawyer was just disconnecting from a call, that Beth could see. And she knew that Sharon recognized the mother just as surely as Beth recognized her if the way the woman hesitated where she stood was any indication. Beth watched her slowly turn and walk away, wanting nothing more than to call out and confront the woman. It had been Sharon's lies and focusing on Mark's mistakes that had caused the trial to fall apart. But it was the memory of Jonathan's talk of guilt that stilled her tongue.

Sharon had to know she had allowed a killer to walk free. That was guilt enough. Privately she prayed that that guilt wouldn't leave the defense lawyer alone, so that maybe she wouldn't try to get another murderer off again.

~/~/~/~/~

"You have no life left. Not here."

It was the best punishment that they could have come up with in the circumstances; Joe Miller sat before her, soft-eyed and bewildered like a little boy and still trying to bleat his innocence. Beth had shut him down immediately and told him exactly what she'd like to do with him.

Her talk of knives unsettled him. That she could see. She had truly and properly scared him with the idea that she and Mark and Ellie, one on either side of her, could kill him without hesitation. And when she lost control for just a moment when speaking of bodies on beaches she could have sworn she saw true, naked remorse on his face like he had only just realized the grief he had thrust upon the mother. She rallied quickly. Now was not the time for tears. Not in front of him.

Ellie flew to her defense the instant Joe tried to tell her he couldn't be exiled from Broadchurch. Her voice grated harsh and cold between clenched teeth, warning Joe away for his own good. When finally Mark hauled Joe to his feet to take him out to the car waiting for him she felt Ellie's hand grip her shoulder tightly and she looked up at her old friend with a strained smile of gratefulness, thankful for her presence.

Perhaps he hadn't landed in prison like they had all wanted, she thought, but he was still punished for what he had done. And his guilt would be worse than any jail cell could be.

She sagged against Mark as she watched the car drive away to take Joe Miller out of Broadchurch forever.


End file.
